IELTS Listening Practice Test 11: Free, with Answers

Director:Good evening, everyone, and thank you for coming. My name's Ian Fletcher, and I'm the director of Greenhill Summer Camp. This summer will be our twelfth year, and I can see some familiar faces tonight, as well as quite a few new ones, so I'll start with the basics.

Director:People often assume that the point of a camp like ours is simply to keep children busy and active during the long holiday. They'll certainly be active, and most of them go home having made several new friends. But what we're really trying to do is give children the confidence to have a go at things they've never tried before, and to discover that failing at something the first time isn't the end of the world. Everything we plan is built around that idea.

Director:Before I go any further, a word about our staff, because I know it's what most of you worry about. Most of them are university students rather than teachers, and several are new this year. But every one of them has completed a first-aid course, and there's one adult for every eight children, which is better than the national guidelines.

Director:As in previous years, the camp runs for two weeks here on the school site, and the children will be in two groups: eight to ten, and eleven to thirteen.

Director:A word about food. All our meals are cooked here by our own chef, and there's always a vegetarian option. This year, for the first time, the children themselves chose the menu, from a list of dishes we gave them last term, so I'm told there'll be rather a lot of pizza. On the day of our trip to the seaside, we provide packed lunches, so you don't need to make anything.

Director:I know you'll all want to hear how your children are getting on. We don't encourage phone calls during the week, because we've found they tend to make children homesick rather than help. And we stopped sending out a printed newsletter a few years ago. Instead, each evening, our staff put photos from the day onto a private page of our website, so you can see exactly what they've been doing.

Director:Now let me tell you about some of the activities. We'll start with archery, which is always popular. You may be pleased to hear there's no extra charge for it, even though the equipment is expensive. It's run by a local archery coach, who comes in specially every Wednesday. He's coached at national level, so the children are learning from someone who really knows what he's doing.

Director:Mountain biking was one of last year's favourites. It doesn't happen on the camp site, because our fields are far too flat. Instead, we take the children in our minibus to the forest trails at Hollins Wood, about fifteen minutes away. It goes ahead even if it's raining, so please make sure your child has a waterproof jacket.

Director:Next, pond dipping. Last autumn, some of our parents spent a weekend digging a pond at the far end of the school field, and it's already full of wildlife, so this summer is the first time we'll be able to offer it. The children will use nets to catch and identify water insects and frogs, and then put them back, of course. The pond has a fence around it, and a member of staff is always there, so there's no need to worry about safety.

Director:Drama runs throughout the second week. Our drama leader is one of the teachers here at the school. She writes a new play every year, and the children help to choose the costumes and make the scenery. It all ends with a short performance on the final Friday afternoon. You're all very welcome to come and watch. It starts at three o'clock, and you can collect your children straight afterwards.

Director:Woodwork is a little different, because the children make something they can take home, usually a bird box or a small stool. Because of the cost of the wood and tools, there's a charge of fifteen pounds for this activity. You can pay it at the office if your child chooses it.

Director:Finally, orienteering. On the first Monday, the children draw their own map of the school grounds. Later in the week, they work in teams of four to find markers hidden around the grounds, using their maps and a compass. The younger ones get a little more help with the compass, but everyone takes part. Right, are there any questions?

Tutor:Come in, Ellie. So, you've just finished your placement at Tumble Toys. How did it go?

Ellie:Really well, thanks. I was a bit nervous at the start, but I learned a huge amount.

Tutor:I remember being surprised when you went to a toy company. It wasn't on the department's list of placements, was it?

Ellie:No, it wasn't. And people keep assuming my cousin arranged it, because she works in marketing at Tumble, but she had nothing to do with it. I'd enjoyed the child development module so much that I just wrote to their research team myself and asked whether they ever took students. I was amazed when they said yes.

Tutor:That makes sense. And what was the hardest part, at first?

Ellie:I'd expected the open-plan office to bother me, because it was so noisy, but I got used to that within a day or two. And the journey was long, but I listened to podcasts on the train. No, the difficult thing was that for the first week, nobody really gave me anything definite to do. Everyone was very friendly, but I spent a lot of time wondering whether I was supposed to be working on something.

Tutor:That's very common, I'm afraid. Companies often aren't sure what to do with students in the first few days. How did you deal with it?

Ellie:I thought about asking for some old research reports to read, or emailing you for advice. But in the end, I asked my supervisor if I could spend a day with each of the different teams. That helped a lot, because then I understood how everything fitted together.

Tutor:That's exactly the kind of thing that should go in your report. Now, I've read your draft. It's well written, and you've used your sources well. And length isn't a problem: you're comfortably within the word limit.

Ellie:But?

Tutor:But at the moment, it mostly tells me what happened. I went to this meeting, I did this task. What I'm not seeing is what you made of it. What did you learn, what would you do differently? That's what the marks are really for.

Ellie:So it needs more reflection.

Tutor:Exactly. And I think part of the problem is the way it's organised. At the moment, you go through it week by week, which makes it read like a diary. You could organise it by project, I suppose, but that would still be mostly description. I'd suggest building each section around one of the skills you developed, such as teamwork or communication, and then using the projects as evidence.

Ellie:That makes sense. I'll restructure it. Oh, one thing I wanted to ask. Can I actually name the company? Or should I make up a name for it?

Tutor:Some students do invent a name, and that's perfectly acceptable. But you said you'd like to send them a copy, so I'd use the real name, as long as you get their permission first, preferably in writing. Your supervisor there should be able to arrange that.

Tutor:Let's go through what you actually did, then, so we can find the evidence for each skill. What did you start with?

Ellie:In the first two weeks, I was helping the testing team check new toys for safety. There are very strict rules about things like small parts that children could swallow, and sharp edges. I hadn't realised how many regulations there are.

Tutor:And after that?

Ellie:Weeks three to five were the best part. The company was developing a range of toy robots, and they invited groups of children in to play with the early versions while we watched. My job was to record what the children did and how long they stayed interested. We filmed each session, and afterwards I went through the videos with a stopwatch, which took much longer than I'd expected.

Tutor:Did anything unexpected come out of that?

Ellie:Lots. The funniest thing was that quite a few of the younger children were more interested in the box than in the robot itself. They kept climbing into it. The designers were a bit upset, but it changed how they thought about the packaging.

Tutor:That's a lovely detail. Make sure it goes into the report. What next?

Ellie:In weeks six and seven, I worked on the instructions for parents. We'd noticed that parents often gave up on them, so I rewrote them in much simpler language, with far fewer words and more pictures, and then tested the new version on a few families. Most of them managed without asking for help, which was really satisfying.

Tutor:That's good evidence for your communication skills. And the last week?

Ellie:I joined the marketing team. They were planning a short advert for the robots. I'd assumed it would be for television, but it's only going to be shown online. I suggested filming a child climbing into the box, and they actually used my idea.

Tutor:Well, that would certainly fit in a section on initiative. I think you've got plenty of material, Ellie. It's mainly a question of reorganising it.

Lecturer:Good morning. Today I'm going to talk about coral reefs, and in particular about the efforts that are being made to repair them. I'll start with why reefs matter, then look at what is damaging them, and finally at four methods scientists are using to bring them back.

Lecturer:Coral reefs cover only a tiny fraction of the ocean floor, less than one per cent. And yet roughly a quarter of all the species that live in the sea depend on them at some point in their lives, for food, for shelter, or as a place to breed. Reefs also protect coastlines by breaking up waves during storms, and they support the fishing and tourism industries of many countries.

Lecturer:What many people don't realise is that a coral is not a rock, or a plant, but an animal. In fact, it's a colony of thousands of tiny animals called polyps. And inside the polyps live microscopic algae. The relationship works for both of them. The coral gives the algae a safe place to live, and the algae use sunlight to produce sugars, which feed the coral. The algae are also what give coral its colour. Without them, the coral is almost transparent.

Lecturer:Reefs face several threats. Fertilisers washing off farmland into the sea encourage seaweed to grow over the coral. Overfishing removes the fish that keep that seaweed under control. And in parts of the Pacific, huge numbers of starfish that feed on coral can strip a reef in a few months. But by far the biggest threat today is heat, and to understand why, we need to go back to those algae.

Lecturer:The problem is that the relationship between coral and algae is very sensitive to temperature. When the sea becomes too warm, even by one or two degrees for a few weeks, the algae start producing harmful substances, and the coral pushes them out. Because the coral's white skeleton then shows through, this is known as bleaching. A bleached coral is not dead, though. If the water cools down quickly enough, the algae can return and the coral can recover. But if the heat lasts too long, the coral starves.

Lecturer:So, what can be done? The oldest method is coral gardening. Divers collect small fragments of healthy coral and grow them in underwater nurseries. In one well-known project in Florida, the fragments are hung from frames made of plastic pipes, which look rather like trees. Hanging in the water, the fragments grow faster than they would on the sea floor, and after a year or so they're planted back onto the damaged reef. Much of the work, such as cleaning the nurseries, is done by volunteer divers, which keeps the costs down.

Lecturer:The second method was discovered by accident. A researcher in Florida was moving a coral from one tank to another when it broke into several small pieces. He expected them to die. Instead, the tiny pieces grew much faster than the original coral. This technique, now called micro-fragmenting, is especially useful for the slow-growing corals that build the main structure of a reef, which normally take decades to grow. When several of these small pieces are planted close together, they can even join up to form a single, larger colony.

Lecturer:A third approach uses the corals' own reproduction. On many reefs, the corals release their eggs and sperm all at once, on just a few nights each year, usually a few days after a full moon. This event is known as spawning. Scientists collect the eggs during spawning, raise the young corals in tanks or floating pools, and then release millions of them onto reefs that need them. It works on a much larger scale than gardening, though most of the young corals still don't survive.

Lecturer:The last method I want to mention is perhaps the most surprising. A healthy reef is a noisy place, full of the clicks and grunts of fish and shrimps, while a damaged reef is almost silent. Researchers working on the Great Barrier Reef put underwater loudspeakers on damaged areas and played recordings of healthy reefs. Over six weeks, twice as many fish arrived at those areas as at silent ones. That matters, because fish help a reef recover by eating the seaweed that would otherwise smother young corals.

Lecturer:However, we should be honest about the limits of all this. Restoration is expensive, and so far it has only covered very small areas compared with the reefs we are losing. Most scientists agree that it can only buy time. Unless we cut the emissions that are warming the oceans, the reefs we plant today will simply bleach again.